"Elvis" 61 grain in the AR 15 thread

[popper]

Cut your alloy down to 4-5% Sb, add a heaping tablespoon of Zep root killer to 10# alloy and mix it in. Alloy at 725ish and mould @ 400F. Cull anything from the mould that looks bad. Quench some from the PC oven & compare results. Works for my 30cal 1:8 PB @ >2k fps. Cu gives hardness with malleability plus strength for the fast twist. Plus I find that my cast have very few surface imperfections. If I pour good, all I ever get is the occasional small C shaped defect from crud out gassing. That small flat nose may require a good spud for seating straight.

 

[Spindrift]

Regarding expander plugs for the Lee flare die; NOE sell them, in a variety of dimentions, for 10$ or so. They have worked well for me. The kind that Ian makes is more sophisticated, though, with a more conical flare section.

 

[Mitty38]

I will keep that in mind. However I am going for it now with what I have.
I do have a very small amount of copper in my mix, because the "tin" I used was all Royal Holland pewter. Which is 2%Copper.
Plus I have not even bothered to quench what I have yet. But trying to avoid that as these are going to be mass loaded and stored. When I finally decide on good enough all my remaining Small rifle primers are getting used up on this load.

But right now I am working in my casting technique, and neck tension, fit .
I am at 3.75 to 4 MOA which is well within my goal as I was going for a 50 yard steel target practice round. The neck tension thing will give me a better consistency at under 4 MOA at worst. Even if I do not get a whole lot tighter , I will be happy with more consistent.

I am so close to 3 MOA it is not funny, with no leading . If I hit that with my current alloy I have a hunting round, and have no reason except for sharts and giggles to go farther. 3 MOA from a $45 Bear Creek Arsenal budget Barrell is the cats meow for me.

 

[Mitty38]

Regarding expander plugs for the Lee flare die; NOE sell them, in a variety of dimentions, for 10$ or so. They have worked well for me. The kind that Ian makes is more sophisticated, though, with a more conical flare section.

Last time Ian was trying to help me with something I jumped the gun and aquired elsewhere what he went thru some work making for me.
I will wait on Ian this time, unless he tells me no go.

 

[Ian]

No promises. Time is short here. I'll see what I can do this weekend.

 

[Mitty38]

No promises. Time is short here. I'll see what I can do this weekend.

No hurries buddy. I have been at this 3+ months another couple weeks, or even a month or so is no issue. Besides I have 100 rounds loaded up at the current formula to play with.
Pluss I am going to be working on my casting the next couple weeks any way.

 

[popper]

You add 50# of alloy to 1# pewter to get 2% tin and copper is basically ZERO (2/50=0.04). Same with most Babbitt. Minimum copper to have an effect is 0.2%. I haven't used tin for several years, still get good fillout.

 

[Mitty38]

Well at it again. Cast up 50 or so Elvis, powder coated them a month ago.Just sized them and loaded them up. 30 just for plinking.
No neck tension sizer yet but for kicks I candle flame anealed 20... WOW ! MAKES NO SENSE but consistantly got 1.5 to 2 moa, with those 20, with no other changes to my recipie. Fluke?? NEED TO CAST SOME MORE AND TRY FOR A REPEAT!

 

[Spindrift]

Interesting!
My own experiments (not extensive) with annealed vs non-annealed cases have shown no difference in accuracy. But this is one of those variables that "depends", I guess.
Anyway, good luck with your project, it seems to be moving in the right direction!

 

[Mitty38]

Interesting!
My own experiments (not extensive) with annealed vs non-annealed cases have shown no difference in accuracy. But this is one of those variables that "depends", I guess.
Anyway, good luck with your project, it seems to be moving in the right direction!

May have been a fluke will have to cast and coat some more then wait a month for the bullets to set. Might be i just did a better job on those?

 

[Ian]

Might be that you gave the alloy time to settle down this time.

I did a daily track of the age hardening curve of some wheelweight/tin alloy by testing multiple bullets from the same powder coated batch. On any given day between day 2 and about 20 there could be a 6-7 BHN spread between the bullets. It about drove me crazy trying to get consistent readings until finally they all settled in about 13 BHN.

So my rule is shoot them the same day you coat them (they will be soft), or wait a month.

 

[Mitty38]

Maybe,
I let the kid and wife shoot up the 30 i had not anealed. So nothing to compare to . I realy need to set aside a day to cast up a hoard of 223, now that my skills have improved.

 

[Spindrift]

edit: I managed to write an answer in the wrong thread

 

[Mitty38]

Got my NOE .228-.224 expander in the mail.
The last batch of 300 I had cast, are a month old or more now.

Plus I just cast about 1000 more to replace those with.

So going to load up 50 rounds using the expander, and see if I can get better groups. Hoping for a consistancy 2moa or less.

If it keeps under 3.5 moa I am going to call it a good and load up a hundred fifty or so.
2inch groups at 50yards or 1inch at 25 good enough to practice standing close drills with.

Then moving on to some 4064 trials.

 

[Tomme boy]

I just got my 224 cast out tonite. They have been sitting about 6 months or so. I have not shot my savage for awhile. I can really shoot this thing better than all of my other guns. The trigger is set at 1.5lbs.

I have a spare drop in trigger for an ar15. I need to use it as it breaks at 2.0lbs +-. I have a mbt-2 trigger in it right now and it is a solid 3.5+ lb two stage trigger.

I hope you have luck now they aged a little.

 

[Mitty38]

Still want to eventually try checks on those. And eventually try a bolt action load if I can find an old axis cheap enough.

I really think the expander along with a little time for the bullets to settle in will make a difference.

One issue I had caught myself on, was I would not cast enough to continue developing with the same batch. And still load up some for fun..

So I just went ahead and cast well over a thousand this time, same pot. Then culled a thousand within 59.8 and 60.1grain.. so That will get rid of one inconsistency.

 

[CWLONGSHOT]

Unless ya really wanna push them. Checks wont be needed on a Powder Coated bullet.

 

[Mitty38]

Ok loading some with the neck expander, 19grain of H335 and 19.2 grain.
If I can shoot 2.5moa or less, consistancy. No wild groups.
I have more then superceded my goal this will be a good practice round . I will be done with developing the .H335 load and moving on.

They seem to mash just a little in a dirt bank with some fragmentation.So maybe even a rabbit hunting round if I can find a lower velocity sweet spot with 4064 later.

Ps.
I may just start loading up some of the fresh bullets with 4064 to get me close to where I need to be. So later I will have a base to work from, after the bullets have a while to set up. I have done some extrapolating. I figure the work up on those can start at 22grain and may end up literally at 25 or so leaving just enough room for the bullet. It may be one of those fill it up to the bottom of the neck and insert bullet loads. They call that compressed, right?

 

[fiver]

yeah sorta, compressed actually moves the powder around in the case and scrunches it.

i'd be more realistic and start at 20 shooting for a goal of around 22.5 maybe 23 with the 4064.
your not in danger of pressure, but you will for sure be zipping things along and have a POI close to the 63-64gr jacketed bullets going about 2850 or so.

 

[YogiSC]

61grain Elvis - 28-30 BHN. 2.175 OAL, mixed brass. 1:9 BCA barrel. 17gr WC747 (sim to IMR4895) - 0.6" @ 25yds. Lock back good, no leading.
18gr - 2" @ 25yds.
Will chrono at some point, report further results.

Interested in others' results.